Mother is the necessity of invention

I left the kiddos a nice list of housework to accomplish today while I was at work. Unfortunately, I think my lovely daughter has done killed my Kirby. Words cannot express my emotions at this hour... a word easily can though: SHIT!

Joycie last vacuumed this past Tuesday morning, on the 4th of July. The Kirby kept shutting itself off, though, as she later explained. I discovered what I thought was the problem with it much later...

But first I have to explain that while on our way over to my sister's house for our 4th of July family barbecue, I glanced down at my left hand on the steering wheel and I noticed the diamond was missing from my engagement ring. Only Joycie was with me in the LaSabre, as Kev drove separately since he had to leave from the BBQ to head into work, so Sammy was with him. Thankfully, Joycie helped to keep the car on the road for the next half mile. Truly, I was instantly so upset, I should probably have just stopped the car. I can develop a strong sentimental attachment to a chunk of cement... so imagine my feelings for the diamond of my engagement ring that I've been wearing nearly non-stop since Christmas of 1982...

I ended up leaving the family party a bit earlier than originally planned because I wanted to get back home and look for my diamond. File that one under Fat Chance. I didn't even know when I last saw it on my finger... I could have lost it at work the day before.

But since Joycie had done some vacuuming, I decided to take a look through the yukky contents of the bag. That's when I discovered the Kirby bag was so totally over-full that the whole vacuum was clogged up. There was also a major snag where a 2" bolt had somehow been sucked up. I cleaned and cleaned, put in a new bag and turned it on. It ran nicely, but then it cut out again. And we're back... SHIT!

I also went through the bag's contents. First of all, how can it be that Reilly is not totally bald?! The amount of dog hair in that bag was amazing. I did manage to find 2 small beads... leftover from when Joycie and her friends were beading at the dining room table last November. (Every time we vacuum in the dining room, we hear another bead or 2 get sucked up... a never-ending source of misplaced beads, that carpet.) However, no diamond.

My engagement ring's diamond is not very large. But it is beautiful. Kevin chose the diamond, and then he chose the setting, and it was a total surprise to me. I am not the type to ever wear a large diamond or a ring with several diamonds, such as the gorgeous ring my niece now has on her finger. I love the simple solitaire setting that Kev chose, not only because it suits my taste perfectly, but also because Kev chose it for me. And I'm mushy that way.

Everywhere I am now, while I am doing whatever... putting on my shoes, working at my desk, making dinner, taking a pee, whatever... I am also looking for my diamond. Constantly.

My sister, Kathy, who was very sympathetic and consoling, tried to make me smile by saying maybe I could take this opportunity to upgrade to a bigger stone. But... I find I do not want a replacement diamond. I think if I don't find my diamond within the next month or so, I will ask Kev to take my engagement ring and get an emerald put in it. Then, if I ever do find my diamond, I can put it back in the setting.

So today, big ticket item on the kids' To Do List was vacuuming. Joycie called me at work and told me that the Kirby, once again, would not stay running. We have another vacuum, so I told her to use that. She explained that it didn't have all the attachments that the Kirby has (um, yeah, I know, since I paid for all those Kirby pieces!). I told her that Necessity Is The Mother Of Invention and to figure it out.

She called me later to tell me the other vacuum also would not stay running, and that it had gotten really hot. I asked her if she had emptied the container (it has no bag), and she said something about it didn't need it. Yeah, it did. Over-full.

Lately, and I'm not really sure why, I've been questioning things that Joycie and Sammy have been telling me... like I get the sense that I'm either the recipient of a flat out fib or a half-truth. For example, another thing on the list was doing the dishes, both sinks full from the evening before. (I'm a great one for leaving dishes until the light of day.) I told Joycie she did a good job on the dishes. Then I said, "there were so many to do, how long did it take you?" What Joycie did not know is that I had already talked to her daddy, who admitted he had done the dishes while Joycie and Sammy were gone this morning over to their aunt's house helping her with some gardening chores. Joycie kind of hemmed and hawed... and I finally put her out of her misery by telling her that her dad had already told me he did the dishes. "Oh," she said, "Dad had them done when I got home, and I didn't want to say coz I thought you'd get ticked at me."
So... that would be Mother Is The Necessity Of Invention.